WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Energy Department will file
an application in early June with the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission for a license to operate a long-delayed nuclear
waste dump in Nevada, Energy Secretary Sam Bodman said on
Thursday.

The Yucca Mountain storage site, located about 90 miles

from Las Vegas, is still at least a decade away from being
finished due to bureaucratic delays and scientific foul-ups.
But the government still needs a license to operate the fuel
dump whenever it is ready. The storage facility was supposed to
open in 1998.

Bodman told reporters on Capitol Hill the department will
send its license application to the NRC early next month.

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Yucca Mountain is designed to store underground millions of
pounds of radioactive waste from 104 U.S. nuclear power
reactors along with tons of leftovers from the country's
nuclear weapons program.